Star Fox Update

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We try out the game's new controls. New movies included.

By Anoop Gantayat

The newly renamed Star Fox Assault occupied a few kiosks at the Nintendo World Touch! DS event in Nagoya yesterday. Having played the game at E3, we were excited to try it out once again to see what's been changed outside of the name.

Nintendo had three demos ready for show-goers: a split screen multiplayer battle, a ground-based free-roaming action sequence and a rails shooting sequence. As there were only two kiosks set up for the game, the waits were long, so we were only able to take a shot at the single player modes.

The free-roaming mode didn't look too far off from what was shown at this years E3, although the version at the Nagoya event was in Japanese (this is actually a huge plus, as we didn't have to listen to the the bad English voices). Developer Namco seems to have tweaked the visuals a bit, but if you download the new videos we've posted, you'll probably recognize what you see.

A new control setup seems to be the big difference in this version. You still control Fox with the left analogue stick, but the C stick is now used to select weapons. If you want to look around and aim (we didn't find ourselves doing either in our playtime), you can press the R shoulder button and have Fox freeze while you change your viewpoint with the analogue stick. A is now used for firing your weapon with Y for jumping and L for locking Fox into a strafe. X switches to scope mode when your character has a sniper rifle equipped, with B activating a barrier, also when the requisite item is in hand.

Obviously, these controls make the game play quite differently from the E3 version. With the controls being less like those of a first person shooter and more like the controls one would expect of a straight action game, we found ourselves playing the game differently, something that should be obvious in the videos that we've posted. We'll have to spend more time with the game to judge for sure, but the control setup seems to work well.

There doesn't seem to be as big a difference in the shooting portion of the game. Namco seems to have put players closer to the action for the latest build, in addition to including a planetary sequence located in a forest. The shooting sequences are definitely a visual showcase for the GameCube, especially once Fox and crew descend to the planet below. You should definitely check out the new movies that we've posted.

The Nintendo World version of Star Fox Assault was listed as being eighty percent complete, meaning a release can't be too far off. Perhaps due to the lengthy development time, there doesn't seem to be too much hype going around for this game, but we certainly liked what we saw in our limited play time at Nintendo World. We'll definitely have to take a closer look when the final version arrives early next year.